Start the car and take me home
by Delenn
Summary: She grins, as deadly as the steel in her hand. "Put your hands up and step out of the car and nobody gets hurt." His eyebrows twitch in something that looks like amusement. "No." Note: This is the first part of a three part series: "I'll begin but I'll start at the end".


**Disclaimer: Recognizable characters are not my own - I just borrow them.**

 **Pairing: Twelve/Mels**

 **Summary: She grins, as deadly as the steel in her hand. "Put your hands up and step out of the car and nobody gets hurt." His eyebrows twitch in something that looks like amusement. "No."**

 **Rated: Mature**

 **Written: 2/24/15-3/31/15**

 **Notes: Title from "Just Tonight" by The Pretty Reckless**

 **This is part 1 of a 3 part series: " I'll begin but I'll start at the end".**

 **Series title from "This time I won't forget" by Kongos.**

 **Thank you to *everyone* who encouraged this fic into life. I was absolutely terrified to show it to anyone, but I couldn't resist its call. Special thanks to Beverly, Becs, Alyssa, and Pam for all their comments, support and betaing! You girls rock. Thanks to your great feedback and the way this fic has taken over my mind, I'm not even gonna lie...**

 **Some notes about timing: This fic takes place circa ~2005. Mels is approximately 16-17 in her current body in this story. Finishing up fifth form. That makes her legal in the UK (as I understand it), and we all know she's older in reality. In the US, this would probably be considered underage (way so, if you take into account that the Doctor is about 2000). If that's not something you're into or that's something dodgy where you live, you've hereby been warned. I didn't specifically note her age, though you can feel it out from the comments in the fic, so you can also just round her up to 18 in your head and pretend it's like the US where that's the age you finish high school.**

* * *

 _Start the car and take me home_

As usual, Mels is looking for an escape route. Leadworth on a weekday doesn't leave her a lot of options. The streets are seemingly empty - all the good little citizens at work or school or tucked safe in their homes.

Of course, nothing is ever quite what it seems, and Mels keeps a careful watch on the alleys and dark corners of the sleepy little town. They're going to be furious when they catch her...

A splash of red - her favorite color - catches her eye, and Mels turns to mark the path of a 1969 E-Type Jaguar meandering through town. She'd know the car anywhere - it's Rory's favorite and he keeps pictures of it everywhere - and neither the car nor driver belong in Leadworth.

Tourist. Perfect.

Mels shifts to a brisk stride to catch up to the vehicle, doing a quick risk assessment. The driver is older and distracted, peering about at the limited scenery Leadworth has to offer. The streets are empty and curtains drawn.

The driver turns at her approach, stopping the car and watching her expectantly. He opens his mouth, but Mels doesn't give him a chance to speak, hiking up her skirt and whipping out her gun, level at his head. The lack of hood is convenient like that. She grins, as deadly as the steel in her hand. "Put your hands up and step out of the car and nobody gets hurt."

His eyebrows twitch in something that looks like amusement. "No."

He's Scottish, like Amy, she can tell the moment he opens his mouth. Only a Scotsman would argue with someone holding a gun to his head.

Mels cocks the barrel and arches one incredulous eyebrow. "No? Are you asking to be shot?"

He has the nerve to scoff. "You're not going to shoot me. It would cause quite a stir, and you're clearly in a hurry." While Mels is still gaping at him, he continues, as though the matter is settled. "If you need a lift, I'll take you."

Blinking and mentally counting to ten in her head, Mels tightens her fingers on the gun and bluffs. "Or I could just take your car, old man."

"I very much doubt that," the scoff is laced with more amusement than challenge - and a quiet sort of certainty that stops Mels in her tracks.

Up close, he's spryer than she'd figured - his eyes sharp and intelligent. He's right, too - she's not about to shoot him in the middle of Leadworth. Not that she has any compunction about shooting strangers, but her parents would be disappointed and her minders - well, it's better not to wonder what they would be.

He waits her out, until Mels lowers the gun with a scowl and tucks it away as she crosses to the passenger side. "Hey, if you want to chauffeur me around, who am I to argue."

He smirks, infuriatingly, and Mels regrets not shooting him. But he's already putting the car into gear and steering them out of Leadworth with blatant disregard for the posted speed and she has to admit that the smirk is a tiny bit sexy too.

"Where to?"

She hadn't actually thought that far ahead. Mels always has four or five backup plans waiting, but she'd not planned past escaping Leadworth. They usually catch her before she gets that far. "Away," she shrugs, trying for noncommittal and wishing that it were true. That she could actually hop in a car and just leave everything behind.

"Where," he repeats, impatient but curious.

He's watching her openly, which is rather reckless for the speed they're travelling at, but the road is wide and open and Mels is feeling reckless. She rests her arms over the door and leans her head out, the wind whipping her curls back as she watches the scenery blur past and turns away from the intensity of his gaze. "Everywhere. Anywhere."

What does it matter? They'll find her, wherever she goes. She might get a few hours or a few days, but she'll never really escape. Back to Leadworth, her certain detention for ditching school and Amy's disapproval. Everyone else is biding their time until graduation, but she's trapped there until Amy gets married, and 26 June 2010 is still a long way off.

"That might take a while," the man next to her muses, startling Mels out of her darker thoughts and dragging her attention back to him. He's grinning at her, "But I'll see what I can do."

He seems so earnest, in a gruff, Scottish way. Mels doesn't know what to make of that. A complete stranger, offering to whisk her away to see the world when she's already held a gun to his head. It's utterly mad.

She finds herself biting her lip to stop from grinning back. "You're mad."

He shrugs, eyes sparkling and only nominally on the road. "Been called worse."

"Me too, but most people call me Mels," she offers before she can think better of it.

"John Smith," he introduces himself with a wry grin that is surprisingly handsome, though he's obviously lying through his teeth.

It hardly matters if he tells her his real name - Mels knows better than most that names come and go. She doesn't blame him - even if she went by her real name, she doubts she'd give it to some gun-wielding stranger. "Sorry about the gun. I just needed to get out of there."

John - or whatever his name is - waves it off as though the incident were inconsequential and already forgotten. "So are you running away, then, Mels?" Mels shrugs stiffly, fighting the urge to squirm under his penetrating gaze, and pointedly avoids the question. "What from? Monsters under your bed?"

Mels glances up sharply at that. Despite the teasing, he looks so genuinely concerned that for a mad moment she wants to tell him how right he is. Mels squashes down the urge viciously, feeling rattled. "Something like that."

John turns back to the road and Mels exhales a breath she didn't realize she'd been holding. "I'm told I'm excellent at frightening away monsters."

Mels fixes her gaze on the countryside, retaining none of it consciously - though she's certain she could draw a high-resolution map of it if needed later - and wishes that the kind of monsters shadowing her every step could be frightened away by some mad Scotsman who thinks he is her knight in shining armor. "Not all monsters get frightened."

"Nonsense," he grumbles, as though she has no idea what she's talking about, "even monsters have bad dreams."

It's ridiculous, but somehow it makes her feel better to imagine that the monsters that plague the corner of her vision might have their own nightmares. "Still not seeing where you come in."

John's eyebrows scrunch up at her mocking. "Oh, I don't know, I can be pretty scary."

Mels laughs, feeling lighter than she has in months. "So scary that you just had your car nicked by a girl," she rolls her eyes, "with you in it."

He argues anyway, even though it's true. "You didn't nick my car - I offered you a lift."

"At gunpoint," she points out, even though she feels a bit bad about that part. She should probably have tried seducing him instead...

"Hardly the first time a woman has pulled a gun on me," he sounds oddly reminiscent. "And here we are," he gestures sweepingly toward the car and countryside.

Mels bites her lip again, feeling strangely comfortable with this man. They're both reckless and mad, and he seems permanently torn between indulging his natural Scottish grumpiness and an easy familiarity that is no less intense. She can't tell how old he is - there's an optimistic youthfulness about him, but his eyes are older, shadowed. Not that age really matters - she's a good deal older than she looks, after all. "Here we are," she agrees, "discussing bad dreams and monsters under beds. How old are you, anyway? Twelve?"

John is amused again, his eyes sparkling and lip curling up in an almost-smile. "I'm older than I look."

That doesn't exactly help. He's middle-aged for a human, certainly, which might make them about the same linear age, though her current body is masquerading as a teenager. It's not a bad body, if she does say so herself, though she might aim for something more her actual age next time. Mels offers her most wicked grin, turning her attention and body slowly toward John. "How old do you think I am?"

He looks her up and down, eyes lingering in a way that is far from innocent. "Older than you look."

He has no right to sound so flirtatious and gruff when he's teasing her. Mels crosses her legs, pleased when her skirt rides up and his eyes dart down to follow the motion, her skin tingling under his perusal. He's let off the accelerator, as though he can't be bothered to focus on driving.

"And how do I look?"

He flirts right back, his voice a low, sexy growl that sends a wave of lust twisting through her insides. "Like trouble."

Mels shifts in her seat until she can crawl over the gear lever and straddle him, warm and hard beneath her. "Think you can handle me?"

The car rolls to a halt in the middle of the road, and he barely manages to park before it stalls. John's hands move from the car to her hips, long fingers tracing the pleats in her skirt. "Oh, I love a bad girl, me."

Mels grins, feeling a delicious spark of arousal at the words. There's something about him, about the way he speaks to her, that leaves her absolutely wanting. It doesn't hurt that he's clever and fit. The boys around Leadworth are all intimidated by her, as well they should be, but here's a man who could finally prove something of a challenge.

"You should marry me, then. I'm practically a psychopath."

The snarky offer slips out before Mels even realizes what she's saying. She cants her hips slowly over his - just enough to tease them both and more than a little to distract from her rash words.

John lifts one hand from playing with her uniform, the gold band around his finger glinting prominently even in the paltry English sun, and Mels doesn't know how she didn't notice it before. Maybe she just didn't care. He smirks, still teasing. "Already married."

She feels an odd lurch at his cavalier statement, and Mels grinds her hips over his to erase it. Her smile is sharp to match her words, a low promise. "And when you go home to your wife every night, you're going to wish she were me."

John groans, fingers digging into her skin even through the heavy fabric of her skirt. "Any man would be lucky to come home to you every night."

He's a silver-fox, this one, with a silver tongue to match. It's rare for Mels to let pretty words go to her head, but he's here and he's hot and she has the time to kill (time to kill; killing time - her whole life, summed up in idioms). Mels runs her hands over his jumper - clicking her nails over each ridiculous stud - before hooking her fingers under the bottom and smirking at the way he jumps when she traces her nails over his bare skin.

But he catches her hands before she can shove the fabric up, his grip so light around her wrists that she doesn't immediately pull away, though she glares at him and feels suddenly wary. She doesn't like being trapped.

He smiles sadly at her, thumbs circling gently over her pulse points. "You don't even know who I am."

Mels does jerk away at that - at his words and his touch. She doesn't need his pity. He's acting like he cares about her, which is ridiculous - he doesn't even know her. And even the people who do know her don't care about her, not really. Rory cares more about Amy and Amy, well, she only cares about her precious raggedy Doctor. Mels is just the burden they're stuck with, and they don't even know why yet. "You don't know who I am either." Mels shifts forward, running her tongue over John's lips, grinning when they open to her instantly. She indulges for only the briefest kiss before withdrawing. "Difference is: I don't care."

Her hands go back to his waistband, moving pointedly to undo his trousers and daring him to try to stop her again. It's obvious he wants her, and he looks like he'd be a fun shag. Mels makes it a habit not to deny herself fun when the opportunity arises.

Instead of protesting, John scrutinizes her for a moment under heavy brows. Then he shrugs out of his coat and lets his hands rest over her bare thighs - tacit permission for her to continue. Mels keeps a wary watch on his hands, but he doesn't go near her holster, instead playing with the edges of her skirt absently. "Is this what you do? Shag strangers in stolen vehicles?"

Like he cares. "Is this what you do? Cheat on your wife?"

"No. Never." He's strangely vehement considering their current positions.

Mels laughs. "First time for everything."

His reply is so soft that she almost doesn't catch it. "And a last time."

Then he surges forward and kisses her before Mels can mock him about the limited virtues of only cheating _once_.

It's nothing at all like the tentative teasing brush of her lips over his earlier. This is raw, forceful, _consuming_ passion - all teeth and tongues and his fingers digging into her hips as he hauls her closer.

Mels arches into him, struggling to catch her breath through her nose, her hands fumbling with the fastenings to his trousers. He bats her hands out of the way without breaking their kiss, shoving her skirt up and running his fingers across the thin cotton of her suddenly very damp knickers.

He pulls back to watch her as his thumb circles her swollen clit, and Mels throws back her head on a gasp. "Fuck me."

"Mmm," he chuckles, and it sounds utterly filthy, "Perhaps later, if you're good."

"And if I'm bad?" Mels rocks her hips over and against him, quickly undoing her tie and the buttons to her blouse.

His eyes dip to her chest. "Definitely," and his fingers hook under the elastic of her knickers.

Mels shifts up on her knees, pushing down her knickers and carefully wriggling out of them while John steadies her with his hands clutching her arse and his mouth tracing her from sternum to navel.

He lingers over the jewel there, flicking it with a pointed tongue and tugging gently on it with his teeth. Mels bites back a moan as each tantalizing touch against metal sends lust radiating out to pool between her legs.

When she can't take it any longer, she hurries to undo the zip to her skirt, but John makes an impatient growling sound and pins her back against the steering wheel. The horn blares, but he pays it no mind as he hikes up her skirt and buries his face between her legs.

"Holy fucking shite," Mels curses, balancing with one hand on his hair and the other on the car door as he applies the same devotion to spreading her open and lapping at her.

"Language." He chastises, pulling back long enough to drag her tie from around her neck and shove it into a wad into her mouth. Mels almost spits it back into his face, but then he resumes his previous task, and she has to admit that the sound she makes would make the horn seem like a whisper by comparison.

She can just see his eyes, the blue searing into her with the heat of a matching flame. Which is nothing compared to the heat between her legs, drawn out by every sure stroke of his tongue, thrusting inside her until she is squirming, desperate for more, even as the weight of his arm stops her from bucking up. Her body is tense and thrumming, and she could come from his tongue alone.

But then he shifts his attention to her clit, adding just a hint of teeth, and Mels feels her legs start to go weak as she fights to catch her breath on a stifled moan.

John brings his free hand between her legs, sliding a long finger through her wetness until he sinks inside her eager depths. He shifts the arm pinning her until he can play with her jewelry again, matching the strokes of his finger and the motions of his tongue against her clit.

When he adds a second finger and crooks them up, Mels explodes in a white-hot ball of bliss, her eyes fluttering shut against the supernova of stars exploding against the cloudy sky.

He withdraws only once the pleasure starts to become too much, lifting his head and letting Mels slide down the steering wheel and into his lap, wiping his mouth carelessly on his sleeve and his hand on the inside of her skirt before he tugs it down.

The sudden silencing of the horn leaves her ears ringing.

Mels spits her tie into the passenger seat, her pulse racing. The man between her legs is nothing like she would have ever expected, and she wants him more now than when she first crawled across the car. If that's what he can do with his mouth - well, Mels has every intention of taking the full tour.

He smirks up at her, pleased with himself. "You taste like sunshine in the dead of winter."

Mels doesn't know what to make of the terribly sweet things he says - perhaps he's just forgotten that he's not with his wife. Mels rocks her hips against the impressive bulge in his trousers. "How terribly poetic for a man who promised to fuck me if I were a bad girl."

This time, he doesn't chastise her for cursing. His eyes darken, fingers walking up her ribs until he can cup her breasts through her bra. "Who says it's one or the other? I'm still going to fuck you," Mels feels her breath catch at the dark, growly tone he curses with, "until you see stars." He smirks. "Well, again, I'd wager."

Mels slips her hands under his jumper, raking her nails along his skin until she just scrapes his nipples and he groans, tensing under her. She leers, one eyebrow arched. "Are you sure you've got the stamina?"

He growls at her and she laughs, their hands quickly tangling in a scramble to undo his trousers and shove them down his pale thighs. "Don't worry about my stamina - worry about keeping up."

"I can hold my own," Mels takes hold of him for emphasis, enjoying the feeling of control that rocks through her when he heaves a shuddering gasp at her touch. "Condom?"

He blinks at her without comprehension. "I - what?" His eyebrows scrunch together helplessly. "What do we need a condom for?"

Mels sighs, though she's slightly pleased at his sudden lack of coherency. "Right. Married." She manages to reach her pack without leaving his lap, rifling through it for a little foil packet. Her human plus biology protects her from diseases, and she's not actually certain that she can get pregnant at all, but there's no use trying to explain that if he panics after the fact. Besides, it makes her feel normal, even if it is a bloody hassle in the moment. Rory had brought home condoms from his first day in nursing school and Amy had been adamant that she carry one - just in case. And so not the moment to be thinking about her parents. "Safety first," she smirks, ripping the packet open with her teeth and rolling it over his cock with a twist of her wrist that makes him groan.

She doesn't give John time to respond, shifting her hips forward until she can brush her wet, quivering sex over the hard length of him. His eyes roll back into his head as Mels takes him as deep as she can manage, feeling her muscles give and stretch to accommodate the intrusion.

One of John's hands settles at her waist, but the other twines through her hair, and when she looks up, he's watching her closely, mouth slightly open and eyes filled with an emotion Mels can't identify. Maybe he'd rather she didn't because he kisses her again, his grip tight in her hair and his tongue sweeping into her mouth.

Mels starts to move then, rocking her hips over his and taking control of the kiss, her teeth tugging at his lower lip and her tongue twining with his. She starts a fast pace, and his fingers dig into her side, grip surprisingly strong as he matches her strokes.

She's still sensitive from her orgasm, and he seems to know just how to move, just how to kiss her and touch her in ways that make her hearts race a frantic beat in her chest. Mels braces her hands on the seatback behind him, her nails digging into the leather. The metal studs in his shirt are warming against her skin, and her piercing clicks against one of them as they move together, wrapped up tightly despite the clothing in the way.

It's not - Mels doesn't know what she was expecting, and it's hard to think when sparks of pleasure shoot through her body every time she sinks down on his cock, but nothing in her life has ever felt quite like this. Mels breaks their kiss to catch her breath, and John buries his head against her neck, sucking and biting his way along her collarbone and chest. "Fuck," Mels hisses, a moan escaping as her sensitive clit brushes against his abdomen every time she takes him all the way in.

His chuckle against her skin is positively obscene, the sound reverberating in her bones. John raises his head enough to nibble at her ear. "Oh, the things I will do to you. I bet you're quite the screamer... would you like me to make you scream, Mels? I think I'd like that, very much. I'd make you scream over and over again, with my prick and my mouth and my fingers, until you lose your voice all together."

Mels bites her lip hard enough that she tastes the sharp copper of her own blood to keep down a sound that feels dangerously close to a scream just at his low, growly tone combined with such deliciously filthy promises. Her body is strung taut and on edge again already, and Mels picks up her pace, setting a punishing rhythm that leaves them both gasping and moaning. "You're welcome to try," she manages, once she's certain her voice will hold.

John chuckles against her skin again, trailing his hand from her hair all the way down her body, stopping to stroke her breasts through the lace of her bra and play with the jewelry in her navel. By the time he wedges his hand between them to brush his fingertips over her clit, Mels nearly jumps as though electrocuted, pleasure zipping under her skin like a live wire.

"Ready?"

Mels grinds down against him, mind too clouded with lust to make sense of the question. And then it doesn't matter because John's talented fingers are circling her clit, while the grip of his other hand tightens on her hip, dragging her roughly against him as he thrusts up into her, head nudging the spot that makes her whole body quiver. Mels moans, rocking her hips in counter to his thrusts, her internal muscles clenching around the hard, hot, throbbing length of him and her vision fading at the edges.

"That's it, just like that. Come on - that's my girl. Scream for me."

He presses his fingers hard against her clit just as his sharp teeth close over her shoulder, and it's all Mels can do to throw her head back and scream out her release. Her whole body shudders, stars behind her eyelids and exploding across her nerves as she rides him through it, her cunt squeezing him desperately.

John's rhythm falters and he manages a few more rough thrusts before he makes a strangled sound against her skin and stills under her.

By the time her vision clears, John is already resting his head back against the seat, eyes closed as he brushes his thumb gently over what is probably a spectacular mark on her shoulder. Mels uncurls her fingers from the leather and tries to judge how long it will be until her legs start working again. Even though they're still joined, Mels already feels skittish, like she needs to put distance between them. "Not bad, for an old guy," she teases, but her voice sounds scratchy even to her own ears and Mels feels her face heat at the reminder that she screamed as promised.

John snorts, ignoring the insult. Then he opens his eyes to watch her buttoning up her shirt, and grins at her, loopy, eyes dark. He lifts a hand back to play with her tightly coiled curls, tugging them out and watching them in seeming fascination. "Your hair is magical, you know. Unique in the universe. All these curls. " He muses, apropos of nothing. "Where does it all come from?"

It's a strangely intimate, endearing gesture, and Mels is momentarily at a loss. She always figured the hair just came with the body, and anyway - everyone's hair is unique. What's so magical about that? She'll admit that there is an awful lot of it, especially compared to her last body. "If you don't stop being all weird and poetic, I'm going to have to shoot you after all," Mels warns, ignoring the traitorous part of her that feels flattered at his attention.

"You're right. Doesn't suit me," he agrees easily, trying to scowl for good measure and failing spectacularly.

Now that their bodies have started to come down, John slips from her regretfully. Mels scoots back against the steering wheel, mindful of the horn. John tugs up his trousers and tucks himself away, tossing the condom out the window with a muttered oath. Mels finishes buttoning her blouse and tucking it into her skirt, though she's lost track of her knickers, and her tie is wet and useless.

John produces a kerchief from his coat pocket and offers it to her. "Would you?"

Distracted cleaning herself up, Mels doesn't quite follow his train of thought. "What? Shoot you?" She hopes he doesn't think her that much of a psychopath. She probably wouldn't shoot him now - not unless it was the only option.

He suddenly looks terribly serious, eyebrows lowered over his shockingly intense blue eyes. "Want to marry me?" Something about his tone is soft and nervous, as though he is genuinely asking for her hand.

Mels rolls her eyes, scrambling off his lap to slouch in her own seat, squirming away from the odd feeling rolling about in her chest when he asks that. "Why? Going to leave your wife for me?"

His whole face lightens, a smile twitching at his lips, though his focus doesn't waver. "I'll have you know that I'm very happily married." He seems determined to impress his marital status on her - as though he's afraid she'll forget. Or as though she'll suddenly want to run away with him, just because he's a good shag.

Mels snorts, but he seems serious. "Right... which is how you found yourself here."

John's eyes sparkle with humor, and he settles back, satisfied and completely ignoring her sarcasm. "Exactly."

Mels rolls her eyes again, sinking lower in her seat and trying to look bored, her face turned away to hide the smile that threatens. He's mad and mysterious and, despite his protests, she thinks he would run away with her, if she asked. She might, if she thought it would do any good.

The engine roars to life eventually, and John whips the car around, headed back toward Leadworth as though it were inevitable.

"What were you doing in Leadworth?"

She turns back toward him for his answer because she is curious and because it'll be easier to tell if he's lying. John is driving well under the posted speed, as though he is as reluctant as her to return. It's a good thing that they're on the back road, or they'd surely be in trouble for multiple traffic violations and public indecency by now. But there is not a car in sight.

John's hands tighten over the steering wheel, and he doesn't quite look at her, though she can see his eyes dart her way. "Looking for my wife."

Something about his tone makes her uncertain. He sounds - lost. Mels bites her lip, considering. She thinks about his too serious declaration of his marital bliss and wonders if he were trying to convince her or himself. "And yet here you are with me."

He does turn to her then, offering her that same, soppy grin. The one that has no place on someone so Scottish. "Here I am," he agrees merrily, all earlier hint of damage well hidden.

He fiddles with the dials on the radio, flipping through stations too fast to give any song a chance, until Mels bats his hand away and picks a station she likes - aptly playing _Coming Undone_. She winks and gives him a look that dares him to change it.

John scowls at her, but his fingers tap the beat out on the steering wheel, either because he secretly likes Korn or because he's incapable of sitting still, she can't tell.

Mels props her legs up on the dash, ankles crossed and skirt riding up. She catches John looking and can't resist poking fun at him a bit, though she's secretly pleased. "Your wife is going to be really cross when you find her."

He shakes his head, chuckling, and braves her glare to turn down the radio once the song ends, apparently choosing silence over heavy metal. "It's hardly my fault - I was kidnapped!"

Gesturing between him and the steering wheel, Mels laughs. "Yeah, right. I didn't even tie you up." Which is a bit of a shame, really, now that she thinks on it.

John snorts at that, as though he were having the same thought. "Promises, promises."

Not to be distracted with dangerous visions of a repeat performance, Mels challenges, "Why are you looking for her, anyway? Has she left you for your philandering ways?"

He scoffs, eyebrows cross. "Hardly. We have an agreement."

"Thought you didn't cheat."

John merely smirks at her and holds his tongue.

It's ridiculous, asking the man she has just shagged about the woman he's supposedly madly in love with. Mels would kick herself if she had the energy to move. Or perhaps just gag herself so that she doesn't keep asking stupid, juvenile questions, like some lovesick puppy. "Well, do I know her? Leadworth isn't exactly London."

He seems more amused than wary. "Perhaps."

She doesn't pay a lot of attention to the people in town specifically. She knows where they're at and whether they leave their vehicles unlocked, but she doesn't bother with details of their personal dramas. She's got enough drama with her father mooning hopelessly after her oblivious mother. Perhaps it's about time she just told the two that they're obviously in love and watched the penny drop. "What's her name?"

He's laughing at her a bit, and Mels wants to smack him for it. "Now that you'll have to discover for yourself."

Crossing her arms over her chest, Mels stares at her chipping nail varnish and pouts. "You're no fun."

John doesn't seem the least bit perturbed, either by the conversation or her accusation. He merely deadpans, "So I've been told," eyes still on the road.

She's not any closer to solving him than when she started. Him or his equally mysterious wife. "She does live around here, though?"

John sighs, choosing his words in that careful way that she's decided means he's probably lying. "Her parents do."

Mels considers that, and him. All piercing gazes and heavy eyebrows. He looks like a rock star or a funeral director, and she thinks they wear the same brand of boots. Imagining him with a wife and in-laws and maybe even fully grown children somewhere seems absolutely ludicrous. Mels picks at her nail varnish, red flakes speckling the upholstery, and observes, "You don't seem like a bloke with a family."

He turns to her with one arched eyebrow. "Don't I?"

She's oddly certain, the more she watches him. Mels pushes herself upright, giving up on subtly. "No. You seem like the type to run just because you can." Like her.

He barely glances at the road, eyes lingering on her as he reaches out and catches her hand in his. "Oh Mels, there's a whole universe to run away in - the trick is finding yourself afterwards."

Mels looks down at their entwined hands, not sure what to make of his reassuring little squeeze. He's looking at her like he can see all the parts of her that are missing. Mels offers her cockiest grin and tugs her hand away. "I know who I am."

He doesn't let her look away this time, and his eyes are galaxies of infinities in that moment - ancient and omniscient. "Do you? Because I'm so much older, and there are days I still don't know what kind of man I am."

"Could be worse - you could be a psychopath." _Like me._

"Who says I'm not?" He holds up her gun, smirking as he disassembles it one handed and tosses the parts to the wind.

Mels gapes, hand going to the holster at her thigh in disbelief. She doesn't know the last time anyone was able to disarm her, let alone without her noticing. She'd almost be impressed if she wasn't absolutely livid at his audacity. "That was mine," she growls, considering killing him with her bare hands.

"I can't let you wander about with a loaded gun. Who knows what trouble you might get into: hijacking cars, kidnapping old men. You could shoot someone on accident." He's still teasing her, taking the piss, and apparently completely unaware of the danger he's in.

The worst part is, he might actually be quite charming, if he hadn't just stolen her gun. Mels counts to ten in her head and digs her nails into her palms. "I'll shoot you on purpose in a minute."

John winks at her. "There now, see, it's a good thing you've not got a gun."

It's so ridiculous and brave and _stupid_ that Mels finds herself laughing with him or at him, and he joins her breezily, as though she hadn't been plotting his imminent death a minute before. She has other guns and, well, she can't exactly blame him for not trusting her with it after how they met.

And she'd really like to know how he did it. Mels appraises him with something that she fears might be respect. It's not often someone gets the better of her and, while she doesn't intend to make it a habit, it would be a shame to kill the only man to manage it straight off. She's not quite that psychopathic.

"I don't believe that, you know," he says, softer and firmer, all the teasing gone, and Mels blinks up, startled out of her perusal of him. "You're not a psychopath. You're just a girl."

Mels rolls her eyes at his logic, resuming her reclined position but never taking her eyes off of him. "A girl who pulled a gun on you and shagged you within the span of an hour."

John waggles one ridiculous eyebrow at her. "As first dates go, I'll admit it was a bit of mixed signals."

She snorts. "All right, I get it now. You really have lost the plot."

"I've lost a lot of things."

Suddenly, it's not funny anymore. He doesn't quite meet her gaze, and Mels feels a brief flash of disquiet. There's something dark lurking in his eyes - some horrible loss that he is shying away from.

For the first time, she wonders if he's lost his wife. He's been oddly careful with his wording, and nothing he's said has implied that his wife is really here, now. Only that he has a wife - or had one.

Mels chews on her lip, feeling a bit bad for prying. She knows all about losing things, no matter how desperately she tries to hold on. "So, this was a date then?" she asks instead, annoyed that she wants his answer to be _yes_.

"A bit of a rubbish one," he huffs, but when he meets her eyes again his are sparkling with amusement, "we didn't even go dancing."

Mels has a suddenly delicious vision of dragging him out to some dark, sweaty club where they could dance all night. "We should definitely _dance_."

John's lip twists up, as though he's fighting back a smile. "Oh, we will."

"Is that a promise?" Mels feels her breath catch a bit at the idea of seeing him again. She shouldn't be so relieved - it's dangerous to want this to be anything other than a one off.

John watches her for a long moment, as though he's searching for something. "Do you want it to be?"

Rolling her eyes, Mels tramps down the part of her that is acting like a schoolgirl with a crush and keeps her tone pointedly sarcastic. "In your dreams."

John chuckles, shaking his head and turning his attention back to the road. "You have no idea."

He drives her down the main street of Leadworth in his fancy red sports car. The street is quiet - everyone still at work or school, though it feels to Mels as though something should have changed - as though she's been gone longer than she has.

He drives back to the spot where he picked her up, by the duck pond that never has any ducks, but he keeps the car idling and doesn't park.

"Not afraid to be seen with me?" Mels teases as she exits the car, taking her time to tuck her damp tie in her pack and swing it over her back before crossing her arms over the door, giving him an excellent view down her blouse.

Annoyingly, John keeps his eyes on her face. "Why should I be? I just took you for a ride," his mouth lilts up into the beginnings of a smirk. It's a bit of an odd turn of phrase for a Scot - a deliberate double entendre.

"That's terrible," Mels accuses, biting her lip and wrapping her hair around one finger, watching him follow the movement.

John reaches down to the floor, and when he lifts his hand her knickers are dangling from one finger before he blatantly tucks them in his pocket. "I'm a bad, rude man," he agrees, eyes sparkling with mischief, "you should definitely stay away from me."

Mels can't deny that she's surprised and impressed by his boldness, stealing her knickers and flirting in the middle of the street with no shame at all. "You can't tell me what to do."

He snorts, shifting back into first, the engine purring under his hands and reminding Mels of those hands so recently on her. "No, I never can."

She pushes off the car slowly. That feels like a goodbye. Not that she expected him to stick around just to take her dancing, but... "You're leaving? What about your wife?"

John offers her a sad smile, eyes boring into her as though he is trying to memorize her. "It seems I've missed her. Got here a wee bit early." His gaze softens, but his knuckles are white over the steering wheel, as though he is clutching it for dear life. "See you around, Melody - I hope we both find who we're looking for."

Mels blinks, but he's already thrown the car into gear and is speeding down the street before making a sharp corner and disappearing from view, heavy metal blasting from the speakers as he goes, the melody lost to the thumping bass.

 _Melody._

She never told him that Mels was short for Melody.

Hearts pounding in her ears, Mels races after him, berating herself for letting _him_ take her gun, hand already clutching the spare knife from her boot. She should have known then - she's been warned about the trickster would-be-god who changes his face. Who else could have disarmed her? Who else would have dared to try?

She rounds the corner and nearly bowls over Amy and Rory, just let out for the day. Mels shoves the hand with the knife behind her, tucking it into her waistband and trying to look nonchalant in the face of her parents' crossed arms and disapproving miens.

Mels stretches to look around them and Rory turns to see what she's looking for, forehead creased, but the red sports car and man inside are long gone.

Amy's glower darkens as she takes in Mels' undoubtedly disheveled appearance. "And where have you been, Little Miss?"

Trying to quell the racing of her hearts, Mels shrugs, offering an easy grin. "Nowhere. Just went for a ride with... a friend..." she turns to Rory, putting on her most casual air, "in a 1969 Jaguar E-Type."

Her father's wide eyes and fanatical enthusiasm over the car effectively drown out her mother's questions (at least, for the moment) and the impossible knowledge, settling deep into her bones.

At least, it _should_ be impossible, but Mels has the strangest feeling she just met the Doctor.

* * *

 _End Notes: Twelve is driving the Jaguar that Eleven gave to Rory and Amy at the end of The God Complex. And yes, it was a 1969 because Moffat is evil like that. When research hurts._


End file.
